I first heard of this last year when we were studying ancient militaries in ROTC. Someone swore that Cleopatra was actually a man dressing like a woman so he and Marc Anthony could safely have a relationship. No one bought it of course, but has anyone else heard this? It's sort of funny, because Cleoparta was said to be an ugly woman. But for it to be true, Ceaser(sp?) would have had to be gay too, or be extremely stupid.

no she was a woman, however she dressed up as a man so that the egyptian people wouldn't question her authority

that's must be such a unique man to actually gave birth to Ceasarian

You're a little closer to the truth than you may realize.
Julius Caesar was said to have been delivered not the natural way, but his mother's belly was cut open and he was taken from the womb this way. His mother survived. The procedure has long been known as a "Caesarean."

From what I recall, Cleopatra was actually Greek. In the past few decades it's been fashionable for the politically correct to say she was black. Nope. She was not. Her detractors at the time created all kinds of fanciful tales about her, all of them portraying her as something of a monster.
The notion she was black came from her detractors, long ago. In fact, I've read that there were even coins minted with Cleopatra's image on them, depicting her with decidedly Negroid features, in an effort to slander her.
It didn't work. She was still loved madly by Marc Antony.
I'd never heard she was a man. But I've heard she wore men's clothing to get more respect from those she ruled.

no, i was refering to the murdered son of cleopatra. Cleopatra's son was named Ceasarion, after the father Julius Ceasar. If you hadn't read it right, she was in love with Ceasar before Anthony.

and yes, she did wore the Pharoah's clothings to demand request cause she's a female on the throne. Back in those days, a woman on a throne was being looked down upon because she's a woman. There's another female pharoah who was written off complete from the Egyptian royal history. she was an excellent pharoah but since she's a woman, she was being look down upon, espcially by the temple priests. It's simple law of be efficient as a man to rule an empire and demand respect from your people.

Cleo WAS a descendant of Alexander.



LINK

and here, too, she's of Greek descent.



LINK

Her skin color?

Well, Egypt was a crossroads of sorts between the world's great Empires. Olive-skinned Greeks and Romans, as well as dark-skinned Nubians were common. So I imagine we would see a diverse makeup of people, with regard to skin tone.

I've always envisioned her as being more like Iman, rather than Liz Taylor.

If this coin is an accurate depiction, I'd have to agree.

I highly doubt that Cleopatra was a man. She may have looked like a man, but she definitely wasn't a man.

People back then had same sex relationships all the time. If this is true (it's not), why would Cleopatra feel the need to dress like a woman to hide it if things like this were out in the open all the time? Or do I just misunderstand something?

Maybe you just misunderstood something, because that got me a little confused in the beginning as well.

I mean like, people of ancient times had same sex relationships all the time (the ancient Greeks did) and I believe those relationships were out in the open, known about, etc. So...what would make it different in a situation like this? Why would Cleopatra feel the need to dress like a woman to "hide" it?

Sorry for the confusion, I'm not good at explaining how I think

Cleopatra is one of the best role models for modern women those who degrade her have no morals

this link has some pictures of her
<********"http://www.mymacedonia.net/cleopatra/cleopatra-pictures.htm" target="_blank">http://www.mymacedonia.net/cleopatra/cleopatra-pictures.htm

im sorry i dont know how to put the link in there right..lol

Same sex relationships were not frowned upon by either greeks or romans. Sex with a women was seen as an act of procreation (having children). Sex between two men was seen as the purest form of love. Greek and Roman culture is filled with homosexual relationships there was absoulutely no need to hide it. As for the egyptians, considering most of the royal families were interbred brothers and sisters reqularly marrying and (preserving) the royal bloodline I truly doubt that any form of relationship that Cleopatra had would be seen as a problem to hide.

Are you certain that's correct? The Romans did occasionally use "Caesarean" deliveries, but only on DEAD women, in order to save a fully-developed fetus.



Alas, "politically correct" all too often means "factually incorrect, but you'd better believe it or else."

Thus Queen Nefertiti, who was almost certainly a Mediterranean Caucasian of the Sophia Loren type, has been magically transformed in recent years into a Black African.

But there were great Black female rulers of Egypt - the Kandakes of Nubia and Ethiopia. Kandake is the root of the Greek name "Candace." The New Testament speaks of a servant of the "Candace of Ethiopia" visiting Jerusalem to offer sacrifice at the Temple. He becomes one of the very first Christians and the Christian Church in Ethiopia dates from him.

The woman on the coin is a lot older than Cleopatra is known to have been when she died.

But weren't there other Cleopatras in the Ptolemaic royal family line who might have appeared earlier on coinage?

Cleopatra was most certainly a woman... she was afterall married to her brother when she was 18 and he was 10. This was likely not a sexual relationship, but a marriage of state (keeping it all in the Ptolemy family). Marrying her to her brother if she were male would NOT have been ok.

It's interesting, there is a lot more coinage than the Antony and Cleopatra coins which depict Cleo.

The coins minted in Syria during her lifetime depict her as being Nubian and quite attractive, but I'd be willing to bet this is because the moneyers of Syria never actually saw her or any likeness of her. She was egyptian to them, and therefore Nubian.

Coins minted in Rome which depicted her as "manly" and decidedly ugly are interesting (and perhaps dubious) because she bares almost identical features to Antony... large nose, flat face etc... this could be again, a mistake of the moneyers who created the designs (moneyers has a great influence on coin designs), or it could have been a direct slight to her, she wasn't well loved by all in Rome. I have NO idea why the folks at Newcastle University have draw the conclusion that she was downright ugly. The coin they have talked about in the news recently, is not terribly rare, although it is highly collectible. This isn't new news at all. (smaller denominations of the same coin can be purchased for anywhere from $165-500+/- USD depending on the condition)

Coins minted in Greece by Ptolemy, show her as being pretty but plain, and often depict her as Isis, the Goddess she claimed to be the incarnation of in Egypt.

It's also important to understand that women rulers were not popular in Cleo's time. It's not inconceivable that she was depicted as "manly" and matronly as a sort of marketing campaign--money was a big factor, it might be the only glimpse of a ruler the common man ever got. The more beautiful she appeared the more she may have been perceived as weak and stupid. Manly or matronly therefore equaled competence. She personally may have approved images of herself to be slightly less than beautiful, and in fact ugly or old.

I'm not sure we'll ever know what she looked like... but I do think we can assume her to be a rather plain, but not ugly, Greek woman.

Yes, Cleopatra of fame was Cleopatra VII (7th) .... From what I know of ancient coinage, I don't think there were any other Ptolemiac Cleopatra's depicted on coinage, but I'm open to being wrong on that. I'm only an ancient coin hobbiest.

Cleopatra a man? Nooooo

As for the Caesarean, yeah I'm pretty sure Cleopatra had one of the first c-sections.

Hollywood and Elizabeth Taylor have alot to answer for.....If you're gonna make a movie about a woman like Cleopatra, you're gonna cast the most beautiful and famous actress on the payroll.....

I don't know that I've ever believed that she actually had a caesarean, I suppose it's possible, but in most cases, women who had c-sections at that time died, either while the operation was being performed, or later from infection. Had she actually survived the ordeal, she likely would not have been able to conceive and carry other children but Cleopatra indeed had three other children with Antony. Antony and Cleopatra's kids were raised by Octavia (Antony's legal wife) after their deaths (Caesarion, Julius' son, was put to death as a danger to the throne). I think a c-section would have been unlikely, not impossible, but quite miraculous if she survived and was still able to have more children.

I think the more common myth (and it gets confusing) is that Julius himself was born of c-section, however, even that seems unlikely since his mother lived to raise him. I think given the surgical techniques of the time, that would have been improbable as well. This myth shows up some 150 years after Caesar's death, and was suggested by Pliny the Elder. Pliny was probably quite liberal with his tale, and arrived at this conclusion through a combination of entmology (Caesar means "to cut") and myths of Roman gods the Julii were suppose to have descended from.

After doing a little research, it seems the first recorded succesful c-section may have been performed in 1500 by a pig gelder, but it's somewhat undocumented. Even into the 19th century, women who had c-sections were only given a 25% survival rate and would never bare children again.

I was just watching the discovery channel today on the Roman empire and its technologhy and the caesarean tale is a myth and the Caesarean was never practiced in antiquity, because they knew it would have killed the mother.

Precisely, although it was practiced if the mother was sure to die (or did die) in labor or by mishap, but I think we can safely assume that she never lived to tell about the experience.

Going by that coin, I wouldn't touch Cleopatra with a 10 foot pole..

She was actually a descendant of one of Alexander's generals Ptolemy but due to marriage with local Egyptian dynasties and remarriages back into the Ptolemy Dynasty she was a inbred "Mutt".

Source: Robin Lane Fox- no link, you have to actually pick up a book written by him.



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